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By Kelly Gavaghan
It's fair to say that it's been a bit quiet for us when it comes to food reviews of late. Everyone seems to be fairly happy just ticking over in Lockdown P3, and are just biding their time until the nation has received the vaccine and a return to normality resumes. Not long now and the cash registers of restaurants and pubs across the land will soon be ringing out and overflowing...
Yes, there have sadly been some casualties, but out of adversity comes opportunity, and we have to take our hats off to the intrepid individuals who have bitten the bullet and started their own food delivery businesses, with great success.
One of these businesses is the Sunday Lunch Club, which, after launching just a few short months ago, appears to be building a good reputation for delivering on quality and taste. I was actually approached by a friend of theirs who asked if I would like a free meal in return for a post, but we don't do that at CIRCUS Magazine. We are longstanding, genuine supporters of the UK Independent Food and Drink Sector and we are happy to pay for quality food and truly support struggling independents. We also like to be able to give you a very honest opinion about our findings, all of which I explained to owner Blake Golding and chef James Bird.
We ordered our lunch for 2 pm on Sunday 7th March, but like with all food deliveries, allowed a half an hour buffer for the food to arrive, and arrive it did at exactly 2.30 pm.
Rich and I have both remarked before that Sunday Lunches tend not to travel well (unless they are being delivered piping hot from a business around the corner). So our first pleasant surprise was when we dived into our bag of goodies to discover that each of the metal and cardboard food containers had a sticker slapped on top stating exactly that, and came with heating instructions.
Heat @ Home
We'd already anticipated that it may need to be heated up, as it was coming from all the way across the city from the kitchens at MK Pavilions where the guys are working from, so we had already preheated the oven. Great! We loaded it up and set the table and in just 10 short minutes it was piping hot, perfect, and ready to plate.
"We couldn't fault this meal!"
The meat we had chosen was slow-cooked lamb shank and outdoor reared pork shoulder with crackling, which also came with a hunk of homemade pork, sage and onion stuffing that was just lovely in terms of taste and texture and I'd go so far as to say, is the nicest stuffing we've had from a food business in a long while.
Moist Meat
The meat itself was just so, so tender and succulent. Because lamb has a high-fat content - as does pork shoulder - they both need to be cooked long and slow so the fat melts and permeates the muscle fibres, softening the meat so it falls away from the bone. I also think that the generous portion of real meaty gravy that both types of meat were covered in during transit probably helped to keep them beautifully moist too.
Vibrant Vegetables
Onto the vegetables. We had carrots, parsnips, braised red cabbage, cauliflower cheese, and of course roast potatoes. Now, bearing in mind that each of these veggie elements requires individual attention, seasoning, timing, and cooking methods they were ALL just superb! The carrots and parsnips had still retained a very slight firmness and of course were beautifully sweet, the braised red cabbage was vibrant and fragrant and still had a very slight 'bite'.
A lot of times when we order cauliflower cheese we're left a little disappointed as it's just one of those vegetables that overcook and falls apart so easily, and when it does that, well, it makes the sauce go watery because, believe it or not, cauliflowers have a 92% water content.
But once again, Sunday Lunch Club's cauliflower cheese was perfect. A nice thick, creamy, tangy, cheesy sauce clung to the still sturdy florets and even Rich - who is the King of Homemade Cauli Cheese - agreed that it was pretty damn fine.
A good roast potato is EVERYTHING to me. They need to be crispy and browned ALL the way around and there also needs to be plenty of them. Guess what? Tick and tick again.
There are 3 more elements: the homemade, real meat gravy. TICK! The beautiful Honey & Wholegrain Mustard basted Pigs in Blankets. TICK TICK! And the giant homemade Yorkshire Pudding. TICK, TICK, TICK!
All in all, we couldn't fault a thing about the meal and thoroughly enjoyed this super Sunday Lunch!
Well done SLC!
IMPORTANT DETAILS:
Dinner per person is £20 and this also includes a homemade dessert which changes weekly.
Telephone: 01908 477197
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1310847149276322
Instagram: @SundayLunchClubMK
My plating up skills aren't the best, but let's face it, more is more when it comes to a good Sunday Roast!
